Rowdy crowd shakes up campus to film viral video

An estimated 300 to 400 people dressed up for a video performance of the "Harlem Shake" near the Student Services Building on the Chico State University campus Sunday afternoon.(Ty Barbour/Staff Photo)

CHICO — Hundreds of students, dressed in Native American headdresses, banana suits and mascot costumes, climbed atop structures and flooded Chico State University Sunday afternoon as they filmed their own version of the "Harlem Shake," a popular viral dance video.

The viral video starts with one person dancing in costume, alone, surrounded by people in a normal situation and then jumpcuts, as the bass drops, to footage with more dancers in outlandish costumes.

"It started with 50 people (on Facebook), after the first day we just started inviting more people, and before we knew it, there were a hundred and then a couple days later, there were 400; officially on the event, there were 1,066 (invited)," said Griffin Mitchell, a Chico State student and co-creator of the event.

The Facebook event page currently lists 2,388 people as "invited," though an estimated 300 to 400 people were actually in attendance at 2 p.m., when dancing began.

After the proposed video gained momentum, a representative from The Orion, Chico State's student-managed newspaper, contacted the creators of the event (Mitchell, Carter Kitley and Ricardo Miranda, all dorm students) and arranged to film and edit the video, Mitchell said.

"We had The Orion film it; they had a good camera and film crew; the one that we're going to edit and go viral with was filmed by that film crew," he said.

Though The Orion does not take ownership of the event, The Orion's video editor, Nicholas Kinoshita, is listed as the video's producer in credits. He used his own editing programs and cameras to make the video, Kinoshita said.

The video has been hosted on YouTube under the username "KinoshitaTV."

University Police Department had no prior knowledge of the event and broke up filming around 2:30 p.m., after cruising by the large gathering on patrol, Sgt. David Bird said.

Officers will be investigating the event in response to safety concerns, as many students were hanging from lamp posts, trees and climbing on top of structures.

Police also found cans of alcoholic beverages among left-behind trash, as the crowd dispersed, Bird said.

The crowd originally gathered between Whitney and Sutter halls on campus before later moving to the quad in front of the Student Services Building (SSC) for more space.

Around "90 percent" of the crowd were dorm students, which is why they originally gathered there, Mitchell said.

"It's all about being random, so we encouraged people to go crazy but keep it within the limits. When you have that many people, a majority are going to be 'with you,'" he said.

"We really had the event under control but there's always going to be stupid people and it's college," Mitchell said.

Staff writer Christina Rafael can be reached at 896-7761, crafael@chicoer.com, or on Twitter @ChristinaRafae1.